Learning Mitigates Genetic Drift

Abstract

Genetic drift is a basic evolutionary principle describing random changes in allelic frequencies with far-reaching consequences in various topics ranging from species conservation efforts to speciation. The conventional approach is to assume that genetic drift has the same effect on all populations undergoing the same change in size, regardless of the different behavior and history of the populations. However, here we show that a simple act of learning from experience can significantly mitigate the effects of genetic drift. Main textGenetic drift is commonly thought to depend on allele frequencies, population size, number of reproducing individuals, and not much else 1,2 . Just as in other areas in biology 3 such a simplistic approach proved to be very useful, but as we show further in this article, it is likely not entirely correct. Just as the phenotype of an individual animal changes and develops during its life so